The Godspeaker Trilogy (55 page)

“Now pay me and be gone,” the sailor said. One hand played with the hilt of his dagger, the other was outstretched, greedy for the kiss of gold. His sharp green gaze darted up and down the pier, alert for the return of his ignorant captain.

Dexterity untied his waist purse from his belt, removed the eight remaining piggets from it, and tossed the purse to the sailor. “There’s twenty talents in there, enough to buy ten slaves, I expect. But you’ve been very helpful, so take it all. And if you’re as smart as you think you are you’ll never breathe a word of this to another soul.”

The sailor laughed, and licked his lips as a stream of gold poured into his hand. Then his one good eye narrowed and he bit a heavy round coin, to be sure.

“I’ll be on my way, then,” said Dexterity. He tucked the second blanket around the slave with blue hair, Zandakar, dithered a moment, and covered him again with the light canvas he kept stowed in the cart for unexpected rain. Better that casually prying eyes catch no glimpse of this particular passenger. Then he unhitched Otto’s reins from the bollard and put his foot on the wheel hub.

The sailor grinned at him. “Come again sometime, and welcome,” he said, trickling his gold out of sight. “We’ll find you another one, eh, with fine ripe titties!”

“I don’t think so,” said Dexterity, and hauled himself into the cart. “But I’m sure it’s a lovely thought. Good day.” With a sharp smack, he slapped the reins against Otto’s indignant rump and never once looked back at the sailor, or the black slave ship, or its roaring red dragon figurehead as they made their way back along the pier towards the merchant’s gate, heading for help in the only possible place it could be found.

U
rsa was in her front garden, pruning roses.

“Jones!” she greeted him as Otto and the cart rattled to a halt by her front gate. “You’re out and about early.”

“Yes, aren’t I?” Dexterity agreed, and cleared his throat. “Ursa, I need your help.”

“You don’t have to tell me,” she said, blotting her dirt-smudged face on her sleeve. “I’m always saying it. But why are you saying it, Jones? Should I be worried?”

He looked up and down the quiet street, where one or two other early risers were going about their business, and leaned as close as he could without actually falling off the cart. “It’s like this,” he began in a confidential whisper.

Behind him, beneath the blanket and canvas coverings, the man with blue hair stirred, groaning.

“What was that?” said Ursa, looking around.

He straightened. “What?”

The man in the cart groaned again, a piteous sound. Ursa planted her hands on her hips. “That!”

“Ah …” he said. Oh dear. Now that he was at the point of confession he found himself unaccountably nervous. Ursa had firm views on slavery. She had firm views on everything. And she wasn’t going to be at all impressed about this.

But that’s not important. The poor man needs physicking and that’s what he’s going to get. And I’m going to get my ears chewed off, I just know it.

“Dexterity Jones, what have you done?” Ursa demanded, dropping her pruning shears into the basket beside her. “Have you gone and run someone down with your donkey cart?”

“No!” he said, offended. “How could I possibly do that? I can walk faster than Otto trots, most days. No. But I do have someone here who’s in need of a physick.”

Lips thinned, expression grim, Ursa pushed open the garden’s front gate. “Jones, what kind of trouble are you landed in now?” she muttered, stamping to the back of the cart.

He swivelled on the driver’s seat and tried to look wounded. “Trouble?” he said, as she pulled back the covering canvas and blanket. “Ah—well—none at all.” Trouble is too light a word .

“Really?” Ursa stared at the groaning naked man with the blue hair. “What do you call him, then?”

“Zandakar,” he said, after a heart-pounding moment.

Ursa’s eyebrows shot up. “Zandakar?”

“Well, it’s his name.”

“And how do you know?” said Ursa, running her physick’s gaze over the unconscious slave’s mistreated body and clearly not liking what she saw.

“Ah …” He cleared his throat again. “Hettie told me.”

“ Hettie told—” With a hard-breathing effort, Ursa bit back the rest. “Never mind. You can explain later. For now, help me get this poor wretch into the house.”

“No, I don’t think so, Ursa. I think he has to stay with me. You can physick him at my place.”

“Your place?” Ursa shook her head. “Out of the question. This isn’t a simple case of a dab of ointment here and a snippet of gauze there. This man’s in a bad way and—”

“I’m sorry, Ursa, but he can’t stay here. Your clinic’s too busy, someone could notice something’s going on. Someone might see him by accident. They’d certainly see me hanging about. And no-one must know this man is in my possession.”

She stared at him, incredulous. “Your possession ? Jones, are you telling me—”

Oh dear. He took a deep breath. “Yes. He’s a slave. I bought him. From a Slyntian.” With the money he’d intended spending on new curtains, and more. The enormity of it smote him without warning.

How can it be right that gold can buy new curtains or a man? What kind of a world equates Zandakar with a bolt of cloth? Something to be purchased?

“Please, Ursa,” he added. “I will explain later, as much as I can. But for now could you get your pills and potions and come home with me? I don’t think this poor fellow should be kept waiting for help any longer, do you?”

“Turn the cart around,” said Ursa curtly, pulling the blanket and canvas back over her newest patient. “And wait.”

As she marched away he looked at the sick man’s shrouded shape. “Don’t you worry, Zandakar. Ursa’s the best physick in Kingseat. You’ll be up and around again in no time, I promise.” Which didn’t look very likely, in truth, but was the kind of thing Ursa insisted sick people needed to hear.

Except he won’t understand me, and I don’t understand him, and how we’re supposed to make head or tail of each other I’m sure I haven’t the first idea.

With an energetic “hup-hup” to Otto he coaxed the cart in the opposite direction. A few moments later Ursa came out of her front door, a bulky, battered leather bag slung over one shoulder and a frown on her face.

“I’ve left a note for Bamfield,” she said, climbing into the cart. “He can manage the clinic on his own for one day. If he can’t then I’m not the teacher I think I am.”

“Thank you, Ursa,” he said quietly. “You won’t regret this.”

She gave him a look. “Don’t be ridiculous, Jones. I’m regretting it already.” She stowed her bag between them and twitched the reins from his fingers. “I’ll drive. You’re slower than an arthritic hen. Come on, Otto, you lazy thing, get a move on or I’ll tan your hide for my winter boots, just see if I don’t!”

Otto flailed his long ears and got a move on.

The journey was completed in ominous silence. Glancing often at Ursa’s set, uncommunicative face, Dexterity pinned his damp hands between his knees.

Oh dear, she’s angry. I knew she would be. But how could I not buy the poor man? Even if Hettie hadn’t told me I must, how could I leave him in that hellish slave ship? I only wish I could’ve bought them all.

They reached home, eventually. Leaving Otto hitched in the cottage’s rear yard, Ursa led the way into the small kitchen. She was stringently clear as to how she wanted things to proceed, which involved clearing Hettie’s long kitchen table and spreading it with an old, thick blanket, boiling a large pot of water for the scalding of soft cloths she had him fetch from the ragbag, and keeping out from underfoot as she ranged her jars and pots and muslin bags of ointments and salves and possets and so forth along the nearby bench. Rolls of bandages she’d brought with her too, and these she set out from small to large, along with the pins to fasten them. She asked for a tub to be placed on the floor at one end of the table, and an armful of clean towels. Then she set out her scissors, shears, tweezers, razor, needles and threads close to hand, and surveyed all with pleased eagle eyes.

“Right,” she said. “Let’s fetch in this Zandakar, shall we?”

For all the skin and boniness of him the man with blue hair was still a weight to carry into the kitchen and lay face-up on the table, where he lolled unconscious, breathing in slow, shallow gasps.

Dexterity uncricked his back. “I must see to Otto. Will you be all right for the while?”

“Of course,” Ursa replied absently, staring at the man on the table. “He’s in no fit state to be thinking of starting a ruckus. Be off to your donkey but don’t dawdle out there, Jones. This is a job for two and no mistake.”

So he unharnessed poor long-suffering Otto, and made up for all this early-morning bustle with extra oats and a generous dollop of molasses.

As he stamped back into the kitchen Ursa said, “Water’s boiling. Put the rags in it then scrub yourself to the elbows, if you please. Use the soap in the green jar by the sink.”

She snapped out orders like a noble but there was no point protesting. It was easier just to do as he was told. “So, Ursa. What do you make of him, then?” he asked, lathering his arms with the yellow paste in the jar. The man with blue hair lay very still, seemingly stuporous, with his eyes half-opened and his hands lax by his sides.

Ursa stood back from the table and balanced her chin on her fingers, frowning gently. “Well, I’d say he’s no older than thirty, at the most. Before this he was strong, fit and healthy. He has good bones, good teeth. There used to be muscle, too, before starvation wasted him. He led an active life, but a hard one. There are old scars beneath the new ones. Some look like wounds from a bladed weapon. At least that’s my guess. I think others were caused by arrows. One of those has been tattooed. Very odd.”

Surprised, Dexterity looked again at the man he’d bought. Bladed weapons? Arrows? “He’s a warrior?”

She shrugged. “Perhaps. I’ve heard there are warrior tribes still in less-civilised lands. Far, far to the east. Of course that could just be romantic rumour. You know what sailors are like.”

Finished with his scrubbing, he reached for a towel and dried his arms. “You think he’s from the east?”

“I don’t know, Jones. All I can tell you is I’ve not seen another man like him. I’ve seen races with dark skin before. We all have. Icthians. The Keldrave. But a dark race with blue eyes and blue hair? Never.”

An unknown warrior. A man of violence. Lying on Hettie’s kitchen table … He cleared his throat. “Do you think he might be dangerous?”

Ursa looked at him. “Do you really need me to answer that?”

“I’m sure he’s not,” he said, feeling anything but sure. Then he was ashamed. Hettie wouldn’t put me in danger. This man won’t hurt me even if he is a warrior. Haven’t I saved his life? Once he’s better I expect we’ll become the best of friends. I’ll just be certain not to leave any knives lying about .

Ursa shook her head. “Let’s hope you’re right, Jones, for your sake. Has he spoken to you?”

“Yes. On the slave ship. But I couldn’t understand a word,” he said, spreading the damp towel over the sink’s edge to dry. “It was a tongue I’ve never heard before and we hear most foreign tongues these days, in Kingseat.”

“We certainly do,” she said thoughtfully. “Did you ask the slavers about him?”

“There was no time. The sailor I bought him from had no business selling me a slave but he was greedy for gold. He couldn’t see the back of us fast enough.”

“And why exactly did you buy this man?” she demanded, then lifted a hand. “No. Don’t tell me, let me guess. Hettie told you.”

Helpless, he looked at her. “I’m sorry, Ursa. But you don’t want me to lie, do you?”

“Believe me, I’m tempted,” she retorted. Then she relented. “But it’s done now. We’ll talk about it later. All that matters for the moment is physicking the poor wretch.” She nodded at the pot of boiling rags. “Empty that.”

He glanced over his shoulder as he strained the steaming water out of the pot, leaving the scalded rags to cool. “I’ve never seen anyone so badly mishandled. The poor fellow’s not dying, is he?”

“No,” sighed Ursa. “But if he’d stayed on that slave ship much longer he’d be more than dying, he’d be stone-cold dead.”

Dexterity joined her beside Hettie’s table and frowned at the naked man he’d bought. No, rescued. Whoever this Zandakar proved to be, one thing was certain. He was no longer a slave. “So … what’s wrong with him?”

Ursa snorted. “You’d get a shorter answer if you asked me what was right.” She pointed to a round, raised ugly scar on his breast. “See that? It’s a brand. About half a year old, I’m guessing. It got badly infected after it was burned into him, see the old pustules? And the way the surrounding muscle has pitted?” Gently she took the blue-haired man by his right shoulder and rolled him towards her. “And these whip marks? Inflicted about the same time, the earliest ones. Some are far more recent, obviously.” With enormous care she let him settle onto his back again. “The rest of his troubles are a result of captivity, forced marching, being chained in tight quarters without fresh air, fresh water or decent food. He’s running a fever and there’s been a blow to the head, too. Bad. It’s a wonder his skull wasn’t cracked like an egg-shell.”

Sickened, Dexterity stared at his unexpected … guest. “But you can heal him, Ursa, can’t you? It’s very important that you heal him.” I know that much, if I don’t know anything else .

“I can try,” Ursa said grimly. “But Jones, this is a sick man who’s been brutally mishandled. And even if I can heal his body there might be damage to his mind, his soul, that no amount of physicking can repair. You need to brace yourself for that. I know my job but I’m not a miracle worker. Whatever you think you need this Zandakar for, I wouldn’t be making any plans just yet.”

Oh dear. “Ursa, I’m afraid I don’t have the first idea why I need him. All I know is I had to get him off that slave ship. As for the rest …” He spread his hands wide. “Your guess is as good as mine.”

Ursa just looked at him. “Yet you risked yourself to buy him because Hettie said so?”

“That’s right.”

“And you’re determined to keep him here, in your home, even though he might be dangerous, because Hettie said so?”